Factors Affecting Corrosion of Buried Cast Iron Pipes
Publication: Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 30, Issue 11
Abstract
Although corrosion of metal in soils has been intensively investigated in the past, a review of the published literature shows that limited research has been undertaken to understand how soil properties affect the corrosion behavior of cast iron pipes, owing to the scarcity of the reported information on buried metal corrosion in its backfill soil condition. In this paper, a methodology is proposed to statistically analyze the effects of soil properties on corrosion behavior, and a comprehensive and long-term historical corrosion database of buried cast iron pipes is thoroughly interpreted. The corrosion is characterized by two time-independent parameters in each sample, that is, the proportionality () and exponent () factors of the power law model. It is found that the exponent factor of power law model is closely associated with the level of soil aeration. It is also found that grouping corrosion data based on soil aeration produces stronger correlations between soil properties and corrosion rates compared with that when taking all soil samples as a whole. The authors conclude that an appropriate classification of soils can benefit the identification of key factors influencing corrosion of buried cast iron pipes at different exposure times. This research provides further knowledge for asset managers and engineers to accurately predict the failure of corrosion-affected cast iron pipes.
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
Financial support from Australian Research Council under DP140101547, LP150100413, and DP170102211 is gratefully acknowledged.
References
Alamilla, J. L., M. A. Espinosa-Medina, and E. Sosa. 2009. “Modelling steel corrosion damage in soil environment.” Corros. Sci. 51 (11): 2628–2638. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2009.06.052.
Aung, N. N., and Y. J. Tan. 2004. “A new method of studying buried steel corrosion and its inhibition using the wire beam electrode.” Corros. Sci. 46 (12): 3057–3067. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2004.04.010.
AWWA (American Water Works Association). 1999. American national standard for polyethylene encasement for ductile-iron pipe systems. ANSI/AWWA C105/A21.5-99. Denver: AWWA.
Bhandari, J., F. Khan, R. Abbassi, V. Garaniya, and R. Ojeda. 2015. “Modelling of pitting corrosion in marine and offshore steel structures—A technical review.” J. Loss Prev. Process Ind. 37: 39–62. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jlp.2015.06.008.
Briggs, L. J., and J. W. McLane. 1910. “Moisture equivalent determinations and their application.” Agron. J. 2 (1): 138–147. https://doi.org/10.2134/agronj1910.00021962000200010024x.
Caleyo, F., J. C. Velázquez, A. Valor, and J. M. Hallen. 2009. “Probability distribution of pitting corrosion depth and rate in underground pipelines: A Monte Carlo study.” Corros. Sci. 51 (9): 1925–1934. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2009.05.019.
Cole, I. S., and D. Marney. 2012. “The science of pipe corrosion: A review of the literature on the corrosion of ferrous metals in soils.” Corros. Sci. 56: 5–16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.corsci.2011.12.001.
Devore, J. L. 2011. Probability and statistics for engineering and the sciences. Melbourne, Australia: Cengage Learning.
Doyle, G., M. V. Seica, and M. W. F. Grabinsky. 2003. “The role of soil in the external corrosion of cast iron water mains in Toronto, Canada.” Can. Geotech. J. 40 (2): 225–236. https://doi.org/10.1139/t02-106.
Ferreira, C. A. M., J. A. C. Ponciano, D. S. Vaitsman, and D. V. Pérez. 2007. “Evaluation of the corrosivity of the soil through its chemical composition.” Sci. Total Environ. 388 (1–3): 250–255. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2007.07.062.
Goodman, N., T. Muster, P. Davis, S. Gould, and D. Marney. 2013. “Accelerated test based on EIS to predict buried steel pipe corrosion.” In Proc., Annual Conf. of the Australasian Corrosion Association 2013, Corrosion and Prevention 2013, 671–682. Melbourne, Australia: Australasian Corrosion Association.
Gupta, S. K., and B. K. Gupta. 1979. “The critical soil moisture content in the underground corrosion of mild steel.” Corros. Sci. 19 (3): 171–178. https://doi.org/10.1016/0010-938X(79)90015-5.
Kreysa, G., and M. Schütze. 2004. Corrosion handbook. Weinheim, Germany: Wiley-VCH.
Kreysa, G., and M. Schütze. 2008. DECHEMA corrosion handbook: Corrosive agents and their interactions with materials. 2nd ed. Frankfurt, Germany: Dechema.
Logan, K., S. Ewing, and I. Denison. 1937. “Soil corrosion testing.” In Proc., Symp. on Corrosion Testing Procedures. Philadelphia: ASTM.
Makar, J. M., R. Desnoyers, and S. E. McDonald. 2001. “Failure modes and mechanisms in gray cast iron pipe.” In Proc., Int. Conf. on Underground Infrastructure Research, 303–312. Rotterdam, Netherlands: A.A. Balkema.
Marcus, P. 2011. Corrosion mechanisms in theory and practice. Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press.
Melchers, R. E. 2008. “Corrosion wastage in aged structures.” In Condition assessment of aged structures, 77–106. Sawston, Cambridge, UK: Woodhead Publishing.
Moore, T. J., and C. T. Hallmark. 1987. “Soil properties influencing corrosion of steel in Texas soils.” Soil. Sci. Soc. Am. J. 51 (5): 1250–1256. https://doi.org/10.2136/sssaj1987.03615995005100050029x.
Murray, J. N., and P. J. Moran. 1989. “Influence of moisture on corrosion of pipeline steel in soils using in situ impedance spectroscopy.” Corrosion 45 (1): 34–43. https://doi.org/10.5006/1.3577885.
Nesic, S., J. Postlethwaite, and S. Olsen. 1996. “An electrochemical model for prediction of corrosion of mild steel in aqueous carbon dioxide solutions.” Corrosion 52 (4): 280–294. https://doi.org/10.5006/1.3293640.
Nie, X. H., X. G. Li, C. W. Du, and Y. F. Cheng. 2009. “Temperature dependence of the electrochemical corrosion characteristics of carbon steel in a salty soil.” J. Appl. Electrochem. 39 (2): 277–282. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10800-008-9669-1.
Norin, M., and T. G. Vinka. 2003. “Corrosion of carbon steel in filling material in an urban environment.” Mater. Corros. 54 (9): 641–651. https://doi.org/10.1002/maco.200303680.
Nürnberger, U. 2012. “Long-time behavior of non-galvanized and galvanized steels for geotechnical stabilization applications.” Mater. Corros. 63 (12): 1173–1180. https://doi.org/10.1002/maco.201206680.
Petersen, R. B., M. Dafter, and R. E. Melchers. 2013. “Modelling the long-term corrosion of cast iron pipes.” In Proc., Annual Conf. of the Australasian Corrosion Association 2013, Corrosion and Prevention 2013, 288–297. Melbourne, Australia: Australasian Corrosion Association.
Petersen, R. B., and R. E. Melchers. 2012. “Long-term corrosion of cast iron cement lined pipes.” In Proc., Annual Conf. of the Australasian Corrosion Association 2012, 146–157. Melbourne, Australia: Australasian Corrosion Association.
Romanoff, M. 1957. Underground corrosion. Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office.
Romanoff, M. 1964. “Exterior corrosion of cast-iron pipe.” J. Am. Water Works Assoc. 56 (9): 1129–1143. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1551-8833.1964.tb01314.x.
Romer, A. E., and G. E. Bell. 2001. “Causes of external corrosion on buried water mains.” In Pipelines 2001: Advances in Pipelines Engineering and Construction, edited by J. P. Castronovo, 1–9. Reston, VA: ASCE.
Rossum, J. R. 1969. “Prediction of pitting rates in ferrous metals from soil parameters.” J. Am. Water Works Assoc. 61 (6): 305–310. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1551-8833.1969.tb03761.x.
Rumsey, D. J. 2015. U Can: Statistics for dummies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Schwerdtfeger, W. J. 1953. “Laboratory measurement of the corrosion of ferrous metals in soils.” J. Res. Nat. Bur. Stand. 50 (6): 329–336.
US Bureau of Plant Industry, Soils, and Agricultural Engineering. 1951. Soil survey manual (No. 18). Washington, DC: Agricultural Research Administration, USDA.
Veihmeyer, F. J., and A. H. Hendrickson. 1931. “The moisture equivalent as a measure of the field capacity of soils.” Soil Sci. 32 (3): 181–194. https://doi.org/10.1097/00010694-193109000-00003.
Wang, W. G., C. Q. Li, D. J. Robert, A. Zhou, and M. Wasim. 2016a. “Full scale corrosion test on buried cast iron pipes.” In Proc., 4th Int. Conf. on Sustainability Construction Materials and Technologies (SCMT4), M109, edited by P. Claisse, E. Ganjian, and T. Naik. Las Vegas: International Committee of the SCMT Conference.
Wang, W. G., D. J. Robert, A. Zhou, and C. Q. Li. 2016b. “Effect of corrosion influencing factors of cast iron pipes in clay soil.” In Proc., 24th Australasian Conf. on the Mechanics of Structures and Materials (ACMSMS24): Advancements and Challenges, 357–362. Leiden, Netherlands: CRC Press.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Materials in Civil Engineering
Volume 30 • Issue 11 • November 2018
Copyright
©2018 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Sep 14, 2017
Accepted: Apr 12, 2018
Published online: Aug 2, 2018
Published in print: Nov 1, 2018
Discussion open until: Jan 2, 2019
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.